Carmody pulled up a chair, sat opposite her and waited. All in a second or two, he noticed the Hudson River through the high casement window behind her, and the digital-photo frame on her desk with her kids and dogs in the randomly looping pictures. He did not see any shots of her husband, but maybe they would come up. Or not. Carmody didn’t frequent the water cooler. He didn’t listen to rumors. Her personal business was none of his. But he did have eyes and ears and got the sense there were problems over her move from Virginia to New York.

“Coffee?”

Morse gestured at the machine with the cup in her hand. She took hers black, no sugar.

“No, thanks,” he said. “I’ve hit my new morning max.”

“How many cups?”

“Three.”

“That’s a lot.”

“It’s down from five. But I’m inching up on my cigarettes.”

“Balance.”

“The secret of a healthy mind and body.”

She lifted her coffee cup to her lips. The sapphire hanging from her neck was a half shade darker than her eyes.

“Don’t mind me,” she said and sipped. “I indulge as I see fit.”

Carmody watched her and said, “When you called me in, I was running a HIVE scenario.”

Morse nodded. HIVE was short for Highly Integrated Virtual Environment, a kind of online training ground with an infinite number of settings that authorized users could access from anywhere in the world.

“Crimea,” she said.

“How did you guess?”

“There’s no morning max on how often you can run the scenario,” she said. “So I assumed you were running it.”

Carmody nodded. “Our man’s been hunkered down there for five months.”

“I know.”

“He could be cooking up anything.”

“I know.”

“We can’t wait forever to move.”

“Agreed.”

“So?”

“We need more information.”

“I got plenty from his lapdog, Gustav Zolcu.”

“Yes,” she said. “But it isn’t enough.”

Carmody looked at her. The Wolf was the most dangerous hacker in the world. He had accomplished knocking Manhattan off the power grid, killing hundreds and almost taking out the president. All on his own string, as far as anyone knew. But according to Zolcu, he had since become even more of a threat.

“Drajan Petrovik has Russian sponsors now. He’s a state actor. Bad news for the human race.”

“You’re convinced we can believe Zolcu?”

Carmody nodded, slowly. “He’s too scared of me to even think of lying. Besides, his boss wouldn’t leave home for some secret Crimean base without an official ticket in. And Russia controls Crimea.”

Morse sat there a minute.